Parasite
by Daisensei Ben
Summary: When tragedy strikes, a protector loses all he loves. Is there a reason to live? Or will only death await?


Disclaimer: Except for a few minor exceptions, the characters in this story are not mine. They belong to their respective creators and  
their lawyers. This is written for fun, not profit.

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Kuh Lon lightly buffed the table, not really seeing it. Within the aged Amazon's head whirled troubled thoughts of her granddaughter, Xian Pu. Ever since that stupid Ranma boy's marriage to the thrice damned Akane, Xian Pu had never left her room. She spent all her time sitting hard in front of her vanity mirror, hardly moving a muscle. Her time not spent simply staring was occupied by endlessly brushing her hair, over and over, without end. Or crying herself to sleep. While she hated to admit it, Kuh Lon preferred the crying. Kuh Lon had seen a fair amount of disassociation from reality, and Xian Pu took the Academy Award for it.

"Mu Tzu," Kuh Lon spoke to the only other person in the restaurant. She presented him with a bowl of ramen noodles. Heavily spiced with saffron. Xian Pu preferred her ramen with lots of saffron in it.

"Please Mu Tzu, give this to her for me,"—no need to specify who Kuh Lon was talking about—"Make sure she is well. And please, ask her to eat it. For… For herself, if no one else."

The Amazon boy nodded. He climbed the stairs, and Kuh Lon was reminded of a funeral march.

At first, the Elder was opposed to Mu Tzu seeing Xian Pu. It made sense not to agitate her with things Xian Pu did not like seeing. But after weeks and then a month of nothing, she had finally sent in the boy. Hoping for a smile, a tear, a grimace of rage, any form of reaction.

The council back home was getting antsy. They had not received Kuh Lon's report in a long time. Progress was being demanded on the Saotome case. And their form of progress was simple: a husband brought home in chains or a wife dead on a spike. Kuh Lon was not anxious to see her granddaughter and heir gutted. She'd been stupid not to see how the council would act. Instead of seeing the way things were, those fools wanted Ranma back under all costs. Even more so, now that the boy had beaten the Phoenix god-king. And she had been so sure…!

Mu Tzu had been gone a long time.

"Mu Tzu?" she called. Silence. As a young girl, Kuh Lon had been a soldier in the Tiger War. While bearing a bold name, the Tiger War was just another conflagration in the ancient war between the Amazons and the Musk Empire. On the slopes of Shanayaka Mountain, a force of Amazons had taken a desperate stand against the overwhelming host of Musk warriors. The women had drawn lots to find out who would be on the front-most line, the line that would receive nearly one hundred percent casualties. Those women who were chosen to face the brunt of the enemy charge wrote their wills, said good-bye to their friends, and named themselves the Dead Guard.

Kuh Lon had been a Dead Guard.

She knew the villainous wiles of silence.

The stairs creaked. The only break in the horrible noiseless cacophony playing endlessly in the restaurant. Mu Tzu was staring as one dead, his eyes locked onto something inside the open door.

Kuh Lon looked into Xian Pu's room.

Blood. Her eternal three hours as a Dead Guard had taught Kuh Lon about blood. The knife was obvious even to a fool. So was Xian Pu's stomach. Feeling a horrible sadness well up in her aged heart, Kuh Lon tried to move Mu Tzu away.

The fist struck her.

Kuh Lon was the last person in Nerima to see Mu Tzu of the Nyu-che-zuu Amazons in Japan ever again. A pity all she saw was his retreating back.

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Dryfield, Nevada.

September 1, 2000

Lee swore as the distributor cab came away in his hands. The unexpected release sent him tumbling backwards, landing hard in a pile of tools. Flipping his ponytail back over his shoulder and a few rogue bangs out of his eyes, Lee stood up to renew the assault. Mary Leigh's ancient Ford sedan had crapped out again. And Gary Douglas was tired of arguing with the 'ornery thing'. In the business world it was well known that if there was a job no one wanted to do, it went to the person with least seniority.

Guess who was bottom-man on the totem pole?

Continuing a long stream of pointless, but very satisfying, expletives and obscenities, Lee battled the white vehicle. Wishing all the while he could cut loose and beat the thing back to the scrap-heap.

And Dryfield had seemed such a perfect place to set down roots. His logic had been that in a small town, there would be less people trying to stick their noses in where they didn't belong. Oh boy had he been wrong. Small towns were miserable, slow, disgusting places. They were places where everyone knew everyone else. Places where gossip spread like a forest-fire on gasoline. Places where if you didn't conform, you were exiled.

There were, however, benefits to disliking your neighbors. You could never get close to them. They could never hurt you.

On a sudden impulse, Lee looked up. Annie was standing there, grinning impishly at him. His cheeks tried to heat. Lee went back to wrestling Mary Leigh's decrepit old Ford.

"Where's Mr. Gary?" asked the former college student, politely ignoring Lee's earlier blue streak.

"His leg popped out again, I think," Lee returned, finally emerging from under the Ford's hood. "He'll be in his trailer, seating it back in. What's up?"

Annie looked about her. "Well… I'm not sure. All I was told was to get you and Mr. Gary and tell you to come up to Anos Butte. Mikie's got something up there, and he wanted you two to see it. Said to make it fast, too."

"Anos Butte? Heck, we'll take ma truck."

Annie jumped a mile in the air. Lee only gazed quietly in Douglas's direction. Gary Douglas had lost his leg in Vietnam, and now made do with a prosthetic. That didn't stop him from moving like a cat when he wanted to. If Gary's staff didn't learn to take it easy, they banged their heads on cars a lot. Lee often wondered just how silent Douglas had been before losing his leg; what else he might have done in Vietnam besides hold a gun.

Douglas's red truck was a cramped space. With only two seats, and Douglas needing all the room he could just to drive it, every ride in it was an adventure. Annie buckled up out of habit, and as Lee was sitting on the outside, wound up sharing the belt with her.

The truck jounced along the dirt road, sending its occupants up and down in spasms of violence. The lighter Annie squealed occasionally and clutched to her sturdier belt-partner for stability. Lee diligently studied the scenery.

Annie had first come to Dryfield six months earlier. A well-meaning professor of geology from some college, both of whom Lee disremembered, had brought a group of students along on a field excursion. Lee was under the impression that it had been an exercise in identifying rocks and minerals in the field instead of laboratory conditions. Douglas Scrapyards had been responsible for storing and transporting all the instruments the good professor and his students used.

Lee was sure he would never see the mischievous freshman ever again. But then Annie had shown up in Dryfield one day. She'd quit college to work as a maid for the Bronco Motel. The ranchers and other old hands around were pleased enough to spit. Too many young people ran away from small towns; hardly any ran to them. Others had wondered. Why give up a chance at an education to work as a minimum-wage laborer? Mary Leigh—the famous Mary Leigh, owner of the bestial white Ford—had suggested that 'improper happenings' had laid Annie low.

Gary Douglas later had to chastise Lee for calling Mary Leigh a gossiping bitch.

But in truth, Lee didn't care one way or the other about why Annie was in Dryfield. She didn't make a habit of sticking her nose in where it didn't belong. And Lee had never met such a cheerful person. Except for maybe…

Lee shook his head. It was nice enough having Annie around. If life had taught him anything, it was to appreciate true friends. They were hard to come by. Annie was a great kid.

"What's so funny, kid?" asked Douglas's gruff voice. Lee turned toward him, questions evident on his face.

"You were smiling for no reason. Unless you like the look of dried sagebrush," supplied Annie.

Caught without a decent reply, Lee grunted like a local and resumed to staring out the window. Annie giggled. Even Douglas chuckled softly into the steering wheel.

Oh goodie, he was starting to think like Douglas. Maybe he should head out of Dryfield as soon as he could. One the other hand, there were worse people to end up like. Mary Leigh Hartman, for example.

"Don't think the kid's got scen'ry on the mind, girl," Douglas spoke to Annie, ignoring Lee's growing discomfort.

Annie gave a smirk. "Maybe he just gets nervous around cute girls like me."

"Okay, that's enough. Let's talk about something else," Lee groused. His companions laughed. "It's not funny!" They laughed harder.

Mikie's ranch was situated at the direct top of Anos Butte, connected to the rest of the world only by a twisting, switch-back road up the north face. Mikie only used one cattle grate to keep his herd in-fenced. The Butte simply and efficiently handled the rest. Mikie also didn't allow any cars more than twenty feet away from the cattle grate, which is why Douglas had to weave through a few vehicles to finally park his truck.

Lee casually stepped down from the truck, stepping back to let Annie hop out. A group of people were standing out in the middle of Mikie's grazing field. That seemed the place to go. The two youths then started up a slow walk, letting Gary set the pace. Lee's eyes swept the face of the Butte, watching the grass and scrub. His forehead was hurting. That only happened when he was in immediate danger. And right now, it felt like a burning hook was twisted in his skull.

Sagebrush rustled.

Lee reacted more than planned. All of a sudden, his knees had bent deeply, his hands thrown back behind him, ready to shoot forward at a moment's notice. His eyes bored in on where he had seen the plants shift. Behind, Gary Douglas, Vietnam veteran, had done something similar. Only with Gary, his cane had become a false rifle, with one end shoved into its owner's shoulder.

"What is it?" asked the only non-combatant of the trio.

Only the wind stirred the desert sage and grasses.

"Prairie dog," answered Douglas finally, not sounding convinced of his theory.

Easing out of his fighting stance, Lee didn't stop watching the suspect spot. "Yeah," he agreed without emotion, "prairie dog." The three resumed walking. Lee remembered back to a few minutes earlier, in the truck. Now, even that wasn't funny. Not at all.

They finally made it to the small cluster of people. Annie was polite and tried to peer past the heads in front of her. Lee was less so. Rich "Redman" Bearclaw squawked in indignation when he was shoved out of the way. Mary Leigh feigned defiance, but even she withered under Lee's gaze.

He very quickly wished he hadn't been in such a hurry. Annie looked, gasped, and turned away. Her face had grown pale. Lee couldn't blame her; it wasn't a pretty sight. Douglas blasphemed.

It was not a normal animal. That much was certain. Its human head was thrown back in a gesture of pain, crying out with mute lips. The neck was too long, like that of a horse or giraffe. Four legs were twisted under it, each limb terminating in a cloven hoof. The hateful thing was busy melting merrily under the Nevada sun.

"What is it?" he finally asked.

Mikie shrugged his thick shoulders. "Don't rightly know. Ah saw it sittin' there in mah field, plain as shit, and tried tah run it off. Whole herd uh 'em. They almost ran me down, but Ah killed thissin an' tha otha's decided that it was a good idea tah run off.

"Ya'll know them cattle mutilatin's that's ah been goin' on?" Nods from the assembled group. "Well, Ah think that thissin an' his buddies been the one's that's doin' it. Ah even had Marge take a picture of that thing an' send it off. Don't know when anybody'll get here, though."

Lee knelt down. He found himself staring into the dead thing's bloodshot eyes. "Those guys who took away the cow carcass, they were from the CDC, weren't they?"

"Yep, but tha G on tha horn told me tah send the picture tah tha FBI. Some group called 'MIST.'"

Lee nodded. "When did you report it in?"

"Oh, 'bout maybe… two, three hours 'go."

Annie must have been thinking along the same lines as Lee. "When you told them about the cattle mutilations, they were here in half an hour. Express chopper, right out of LA. Now that we have a body on our hands, they're taking their sweet time?"

"Yep."

For a moment, there was only the call of insects in the sand.

"Whattaya think it is, kid?" asked Mary Leigh. "Ya ever see anythin' like it?"

"Of course, grasshopper," wheezed Lee, thickening his accent, "All China know of such things. We just never tell no round-eye." He dropped the sarcasm, looking the bane of Dryfield in the eye. "Hell no I don't have a clue what this is! I don't think anyone's seen this thing before."

That started it. Mary Leigh, citing insult, leapt at her adversary, seeking to parry him with her razor tongue. Lee responded in kind, perhaps not as wittingly, but just as pungent and more forceful. Annie was alternately defending Lee and trying to separate the two verbal-combatants. Mikie began arguing that everyone should break it up. Roy waded in and began kicking ass for the sake of wading in and kicking ass.

A single roar, bellowing greater than a bull, crushed the fray. "Shut up!" Everyone noticed that Douglas was red in the face, and looked fit enough to kill. All concerned parties followed orders.

Douglas went on. "Now, Mikie, you said these things high-tailed it outta here? Did they jump yer cattle gate?"

"Nah. They went over the side."

"They jumped?"

"Not that. They slid right on down the side. Didn't think nothin' of it."

Douglas grunted, a sure sign he was doing some serious thinking. "Anyone 'sides me notice it ain't drawin' flies?"

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Dryfield, Nevada

September 2, 2000

"Lee! Lee, wake up, _please!_"

Lee jerked awake, bolting upright in his bed. Ignoring the fact the jeans he was wearing proudly displayed his boxer shorts, he hustled to the door of his trailer and threw it open. Annie stood there, panicky tears streaming down her cheeks.

"It's Gene, Lee. Something had gotten him bad, and oh my dear God, he looks like a Russian got to him, and please Lee, you need to come, please!" Annie's speech had fallen back into the not-quite-Bronx of her younger years, and Lee had trouble keeping up, but he got the message easily enough. Snagging his boots from the step, he took off after her, struggling on the footwear as he ran.

Gene Romier's house wasn't that far from the saloon that bore his name. Of course, that was damning with faint praise; nowhere in Dryfield city limits was far from the _Gene and Rick's_. The lights in the saloon, usually off this time of night, blazed brighter than they ever did. Already, a few people were milling around inside the bar. Someone, Lee couldn't be sure who, walked over to the rack of alcohol and grabbed a rather large bottle.

Lee and Annie stepped into the saloon. Rick Bailer studied them with a sour face. Douglas was already there, rummaging through his medkit. Being a veteran, he was the closest thing Dryfield had to a doctor. Lee noticed the bandages and disinfectant were already out.

"Guess you got the word, Lee," stated Douglas calmly. Lee just nodded.

"Gene's upstairs, if you wanna look. But you, Annie, you look like you need ta siddown." Douglas pulled a chair over to the pool table where he was working. "Go on, have a seat."

Annie shakily agreed, moving to sit by the grizzled older man. Lee was struck by how much worse she looked under the bright lights. Forcing himself away from the sight, Lee made his way toward the kitchen. Once there he stepped back out into the night, and climbed the stairs right next to the door.

Lee stepped into Gene's bedroom and stopped dead. He'd seen a lot of people cut up, but none as thorough as what he saw here. The older man was scrapped up all over, like he'd fell down a mountain. But most of the scratches were on his face and arms. Whatever had happened to Gene, he'd thrown up his hands to ward it off, but that hadn't helped. Lee revised his opinion after looking at the wounds again. Something had tried to get at Gene.

Gene was, perhaps fortunately, completely out of it. A bottle of stiff whiskey by the bed explained why. Someone had taken the time to expose all of Gene's wounds, but arrange the sheets so that the man was plenty warm. Lee leaned in close to inspect the wounds. They weren't knife cuts or stabs. They weren't claw marks. If anything, they looked like bites. Something with a lot of really small teeth and two really big ones.

"Not gonna wig out on me, are ya Lee?" Turning, Lee saw Douglas' large frame pass by the doorway. He shook his head.

"Good." Douglas passed him a roll of bandages and a swab that smelled of hydrogen-peroxide. "I need a little help here."

Lee set to work. Patching up the cuts brought back a lot of memories, none of them pleasant. He had way too much experience with taking care of wounds.

"Do we know what happened?" Part of the reason for asking that was genuine concern. Part of it was desire to get away from his unpleasant ruminations.

"Before we put him under, we asked Gene that same thing. Turns out, he heard a scratchin' outside his window. So he goes to investigate. Nothin' there. He thinks 'huh, must be the wind,' an' he goes back to bed. Then it comes again, but this time, it's got some kind of chirpin' or twitterin' with it. Said it sounded just like a buncha evil schoolgirls about to play a prank on someone. The thing at Mikie's got him nervous, so he goes outside with his shotgun. He follows the sound, and next thing he knows, whole buncha bats all over him."

"Bats?" hissed Lee, worried now.

"Yeah, bats, big un's. He starts screamin' an' runs back inside. Folks hear the screams, and everybody starts roustin' everybody else."

"Bats?" Lee looked again at Gene's body. "Gary, there is not a bat in the world that has two teeth that big."

Douglas looked at him, drawing his eyes from his work. "I know that. But he says bats, and I believe him. Gene ain't dumb enough to mistake a bat for anythin' else but, and ain't gonna mistake anythin' else for a bat. We even found one a' the bastards on him." Douglas pointed to the table.

Lee got up and walked over to the table. "Gary, this is no bat," he said upon seeing the thing lying there.

"I know."

"How long has this thing been lying here?"

"Bout… Fifteen minutes."

"Gary… it's melting. And it's melting faster than the thing at Mikie's."

"I know." Silently, the two of them returned to their work.

When Lee finally made it back into the saloon, even more people had shown up. The bane of his existence, Mary Leigh, was there, sticking her damned nose into everyone else's business. She sneered at him, making no bones about her displeasure to see him. Lee snorted. She was just still pissed over… damn, had it really happened yesterday? Lee would have guessed either early today or a thousand years ago.

He didn't really hear what Mary Leigh had to say, other than that it was insulting and annoying. His hand shot out, grasping around her neck. Lee's thumb was pressing into Mary Leigh's jugular vein; his fingers dug into her other jugular. He made sure to look into her eyes; made sure his point had been understood. Then he left for the door.

The desert sky was always brilliant at night. It was usually cold, but beautiful nonetheless. A sea of stars stretched out overhead, the kind of star sea that can only be seen far and away from the lights of humanity. Lee realized he was smiling.

He'd only gone a few paces when he heard a distinctive crunch. Looking down, Lee saw the telltale stinger of a desert scorpion. He'd learned a lot about scorpions in his two years at Dryfield. Knocking out his shoes, checking his bed before climbing in, and always wearing thick boots had become second nature. Frankly, Lee was impressed at this scorpion. The pincers jutted, still intact, from underneath his heel. The tail and a small part of the body protruded ahead of his toes.

Sure was a big one.

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Author's notes: this has been one of my pet projects for a while, but I tend to work on it very slowly. It actually was inspired by a minor character who transforms into a monster right before the main character's eyes in a game/anime/movie I liked. Kudos if you can guess the crossovers!


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